Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear & the Selling of American Empire (2004)

Critic Reviews

• Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

  The most outspoken and yet in some ways the calmest of the new documentaries opposing the Bush presidency.

• Frank Scheck, Hollywood Reporter

  Although the positions are by now familiar, especially for those who have seen the previously released films on the subject, there's enough solid and persuasive analysis here to give this effort a fresh urgency.

• Megan Lehmann, New York Post

  There's really nothing new here ... and lacking the drama and humor of Fahrenheit 9/11, it is even more likely to be preaching to the converted.

• Jack Mathews, New York Daily News

  There's nothing like facts to prosecute a case, and this documentary about the Bush administration's pre-9/11 determination to invade Iraq is nothing if not fact-based.

• Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post

  Where Hijacking does its job best is in laying out the historical details of what Kwiatkowski calls the 'storyline' leading up to the Iraq invasion, a narrative fiction prepared and sold by neocons to a gullible, and scared, public.

• Anita Gates, New York Times

  This sobering documentary proposes that the real reason for the war with Iraq is a two-decade, three-administration, neo-conservative master plan to take over the world.

• Prairie Miller, WBAI Web Radio

  Is there a direct connection between 9/11, the invasion of Iraq, Hitler, Gary Cooper, George Bush, shock and awe, condoms and toasters, shopping, and the fall of the Soviet Union? These filmmakers think so.

• MaryAnn Johanson, Flick Filosopher

  [I]n our toxic media environment... Hijacking Catastrophe becomes even more vital for anyone who considers himself informed on current events...

• Ernest Hardy, L.A. Weekly

  An intellectually steelier case against Bush, his cabalistic administration and the Iraq war than Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11.

• Eric Monder, Film Journal International

  Serious, sober, even chilling, and answers the question of why the U.S. went to war in Iraq better than any other recent film or television show on the subject.

• Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, Spirituality and Practice

  This hard-hitting documentary criticizes the macho underpinnings of an American foreign policy based on military prowess to establish global dominance.

• Maitland McDonagh, TV Guide's Movie Guide

  The film's form is measured, but its message is incendiary.

• Jordan Reed, Boxoffice Magazine

  No doubt it's a strong case. Why, then, does it feel so unconstructive?

• Ed Gonzalez, Slant Magazine

  It's the alpha male pathology that drives men to war and motivates them to want to protect their own that Hijacking Catastrophe explores most effectively.

• Harvey S. Karten, Compuserve

  A solid primer on the errors of the Bush administration.

Read all 15 critic reviews